SOME CONTROVERSIES 125 



is that as trout lie with their heads to the current 

 the angler is less visible to them when he comes up 

 behind them. It is the sort of obvious benefit which 

 I should never have dreamed of questioning but 

 for an experience on a small mountain river during 

 a period of dead low water and great heat one August. 

 The stream was so fine and so clear that I found 

 it impossible to cover the tails of the little pools even 

 by the most cautious approach. Do what I would 

 I could not get a fly to them without starting a 

 sauve qui pent among the trout lying in the shallow 

 water. They ran up into the pools, of course, and 

 spread the alarm everywhere, so that, except for a 

 chance with dry fly in certain places, it seemed 

 hopeless to fish before dusk. But one day I tried 

 fishing downstream, to see if it would be possible 

 to get anything out of the stickles at the heads of 

 the pools. And to my surprise I found that the 

 fish were very much more approachable in this way. 

 Indeed, at last I succeeded in killing some, though 

 not many, and had to revise my ideas as to the 

 invariable superiority of the upstream method on 

 the score of visibility to the fish. 



I have previously related an experience on the 

 Kennet which also cast doubts on the visibility 

 axiom. In that case I should have said that fishing 

 downstream I must be a much more visible object 

 than when fishing up. But the trout did not behave 



